Guest Charlotte J Posted January 26, 2012 Share Posted January 26, 2012 Hi there, First post. Please be gentle with me. ;) We are not, at this time, a homeschooling family. I am very interested, my husband is less so. He has several concerns, including socialization (which I'm slowly working on with him), and budget. I'm a part-time student right now, taking pre-requisites for a nursing degree. This is a second career for me, as I spent the last twelve years as a systems analyst. Short version - nursing can be done part time (more time with family), systems analysis cannot. I have two kids, Henry, age 6 and in first grade, and Edward, age 5 and in kindergarten. Edward has just been diagnosed with ADHD, combined type. He's not having any trouble learning anything, just sitting still while doing so. IN addition to so many other reasons that HSing is attractive to me, in a home environment we could be a little more flexible with his needs. For the next year and a half, I'm only taking 7 credits a semester, which I can do in the evening and on-line. But after that, I'll either be doing a 2 year local associates program, with clinicals, or an 18 month accelerated BSN program an hour's drive away. The local program could potentially allow me to HS in the mornings, and do clinicals and classes in the afternoon or evening. It would be a LOT, but doable. So the meat of my question... I know a lot of homeschooling families have two jobs, or schedules which don't allow one parent to be home full time. What do you do about child care? I know there's an option of a private nanny, but with one income and me in school, the budget is tight. Maybe I'm looking for something that doesn't exist, but I'm sure that there are probably situations I haven't even thought of. I'm all ears! Thanks, Charlotte Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Random Posted January 26, 2012 Share Posted January 26, 2012 Hi Charlotte! From what I've heard secondhand, nursing school is not something you can do while you have other significant commitments. In other words, it seems like you would be expecting too much to be able to do clinicals and homeschool. However, everyone is different, and only you know your limits! I think having a nursing career while homeschooling is very doable. I think you should decide on your priority, and pursue that. If it is homeschooling, then maybe your education has to wait. If your priority is your education, then maybe homeschooling isn't a good fit for your family. What do you think? Are you a very disciplined, organized, driven person who can handle lots of heavy-duty commitments at once? As a side note...why isn't part-time work as a systems analyst a possibility? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hwin Posted January 26, 2012 Share Posted January 26, 2012 We send our son to an in-home daycare 2 days a week - between my husband's and my schedule, this is the best we can manage. I would much prefer having a nanny who could take my son to homeschool activities. We are in the same situation, but I'm not doing so well at the socialization thing. It's hard to get your child to kid activities when your own schedule is chock full. Also, homeschool co-ops require parent participation, and we've never been able to commit to 26 Fridays in a given year. As far as having the time to actually do school with your children, I find it's a fairly small time commitment (about 1-2 hrs a day, 4x/week) with a 5 and 6 year old. The planning can be extensive, depending on how customized you need it to be. You might want to try and squeeze in more stuff during summers and winter break. You'll have to devise an unusual schedule, and also decide if the time spent in daycare would be any different than spending time in school. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Charlotte J Posted January 26, 2012 Share Posted January 26, 2012 In my area, there really aren't any jobs in software development that are part time. That's also just the short version, the longer version involves my intense desire to be out of the cubicle and to give something back to society. :D As far as I'm concerned, I'd love to put off school until the boys were older, and homeschool. It would be hard on the budget, which would make it much more difficult to convince my husband. It might be that I HS next year, when I'm still going part time, and see if it makes a significant difference in my son's behavior, learning, etc. And then we could go from there. Conceivably, I could then do the 18 month program, send them back to PS for that time, then play it by ear. I'm not thrilled by going in-again, out-again, but if anybody has experience with that, again, I'm all ears. I've tried doing the afterschooling thing, but with homework (yes, homework in kindergarten. Ugh) and other commitments, it doesn't leave them with enough time for play. I'm going to take another shot at summer-homeschooling again next summer. Last summer, we started up pretty well, then I ended up in the hospital, and that (plus travel) threw us off for the rest of the summer. Does anybody trade teaching days with other homeschooling parents? I doubt I could make it work with the full time nursing track, but I would think that if it were a day or two a week it would work. I'm just not sure if that's common. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tarreymere Posted January 26, 2012 Share Posted January 26, 2012 You could look into any homeschool organizations in your area and make some friends. Then when the time comes for you to go to school full-time you might know a homeschool mom or two who would be willing to help you out or you might know a homeschooled teen who would be available during the times you need and not adverse to supervising a little schoolwork. It IS doable, but it can be daunting to figure out the logistics. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G5052 Posted January 26, 2012 Share Posted January 26, 2012 I have several friends who are nurses and homeschool, but they were all experienced nurses before undertaking this. My impression is that it is hard to find part-time work right out of nursing school. The moms I know who are part-time nurses do mainly evenings and weekends and/or have husbands who work 4 days a week. Working full-time as a nurse and homeschooling is possible, but as you say, the issue will be childcare. The gal I know who does this leaves her older ones alone and takes her younger ones to a family daycare situation that charges per day. She homeschools the younger ones when she's off, which means some weekend work. I've always worked and homeschooled, but thankfully have work that I mostly do from home. That makes it busy, but not too bad. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.